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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24582436">Oh but it's a dark future, my star. Oh but it's a soft morning for us soon.</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/firelord65/pseuds/feckyeswriting'>feckyeswriting (firelord65)</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Star Wars Sequel Trilogy</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, F/M, Fix-It, Force Ghost Anakin Skywalker, Mustafar (Star Wars), Post-Canon, Resurrection, fandom 5K</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-06-30</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-06-30</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-04 05:27:23</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Major Character Death</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>5,321</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24582436</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/firelord65/pseuds/feckyeswriting</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Rey's desperate quest to bring back Ben Solo leads her to an old Imperial stronghold on Mustafar.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Fandom 5K 2020, Star Wars Multishippers</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Oh but it's a dark future, my star. Oh but it's a soft morning for us soon.</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">
      <li>For <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/intoxicatelou/gifts">intoxicatelou</a>.</li>



    </ul><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>If you've played the VR game "Vader Immortal" last year, you may recognize some of the new canon plot points that were pulled in for this story. If you haven't, no worries! Everything is explained by a friendly face when it needs to be. </p><p>Intoxicatelou, I hope that you enjoy!</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It’s funny sometimes what things will remind Rey of him. She stood at the back of a caravan ship mere minutes from takeoff struggling with the absolutely insane idea to shove her way outside. All because she spotted someone tall, dark, and… No, it wasn’t Ben. It couldn’t be. Rey bit her lip and slowly eased into a free seat. Her arms tucked tightly about her sides as she repeated to herself <em> this was what Rose warned her about. </em></p><p>When you lose someone, you see their ghost everywhere. </p><p>Her eyes still scoured the port crowd until the hatch closed and the engines thrummed to life under her feet. In a sea of a hundred sentients she was bound to find a surly, black-haired humanoid. The ship rose in a plume of exhaust and dust. </p><p>Rey shook her head and closed her eyes. She had to keep looking ahead, not behind. Three weeks of researching, investigating, and ultimately wasting time here on Nevv’ar had her grasping at any shred of hope. Three weeks wasn’t that long, not really, but it had felt like a century without a shred of progress. When her next lead presented itself in her comm inbox, Rey jumped to secure passage out of the system. </p><p>Now she was once again rattling around in the back of a ship, jettisoning off to the next threadbare opportunity. Rey flipped open her palm-sized comm. It wasn’t elegant, just like her. She peeled open one eye to scan through the message once more.</p>
<p></p><blockquote>
  <p>&gt;&gt;&gt;Re: re: re: RE: Still Searching<br/>
&gt;&gt;&gt;From: User#0020450669</p>
  <p>&gt;&gt;&gt;Dom’s been digging through the old docs again. These were from the Imp’s stockpile. The ones we pulled from the <em> Veers</em>. He doesn’t think it’ll turn up much but you said any data’s good data. <br/>
&gt;&gt;&gt;Back on mustafar before it got sorta green i guess? Theres a whole bunch of Imp manifests for excavation equipment and a whole dang hangar system getting brought in. Big supply chain = big job, right? And this was V’s personal log. <br/>
&gt;&gt;&gt;Something about a family line being tethered to the bright star -- maybe the system’s sun? -- and how it could be used with the force (your favorite, am I right?) to bring someone back to life.<br/>
&gt;&gt;&gt;That’s pretty much it though. You know how the logs are. Not everything’s decryptable. Dom’s gonna keep working on it. Keep the lines open. </p>
  <p>&gt;&gt;&gt;[unparsable icon - FLOWER]</p>
</blockquote><p>Rey snapped the comm closed again. She had read the message twice already today. Just to confirm that she was getting on the right flight plan. Not that her heart fluttered when she read the most important words. </p><p>Resting her head against the bulkhead, Rey exhaled harshly. She needed to reign it in. Her wallet was getting light - not that she knew any other way to live. But she was running out of leads to follow. Rose was scraping the bottom of the barrel to send this one through. It didn’t even have a location beyond the whole damn planet. Her fool’s errand couldn’t be sustained indefinitely. </p><p>She couldn’t keep living on the hope that Ben Solo could be resurrected. </p>
<hr/><p>It wasn’t fair that dreams gave Rey the most time with him. He had that lightness to him. His shoulders didn’t carry the heavy, stanch set to them that Kylo Ren bore. But he also was feathered, undefined at the edges. </p><p>It wasn’t real. Rey knew that. </p><p>But still, to sit in his arms. To bask in that bubble of joy which she’d felt between them when they sat on the floor of Exegol. Ben’s soul had been bright and full of life. Rey had <em> felt </em> it when he pulled her out of the void. How then had he been allowed to be taken away from her?</p><p>Beside her, Ben moved his lips. Rey furrowed her brow and shook her head as she had so many times. When they stood together, here on the tumultuous cliff side overlooking <em> nothingness</em>, he sometimes tried to speak. It was pointless. This was just a dream. No sound crossed the space between them save for the unending wind. </p><p>Rey clutched his hand in hers and focused on sending warmth back to him. The physical contact stilled his mouth, sending a slow, wry smile along his jaw. Rey sighed. </p><p>How cruel her thoughts could be. </p>
<hr/><p>The ship docked with a crash, jarring Rey quickly from her hazy dreams. At least she didn’t have to watch his face when she left. That always left her with a dull ache, a wound that no one could quite fathom. Who mourned saying goodbye again to the dead? </p><p>Her trip was merely on to the next stage. On to a quivering, shuddering shuttle. Then to a courier’s lightning-in-a-bottle craft. Stop over for two days on a station while she worked off her next jaunt’s fees by scrapping droids.</p><p>Beebee Eight would have to forgive her for how quickly she tore down the derelict astromechs. But the faster her hands worked, the sooner she was back with durasteel vibrating under her feet and the station in the rear view. </p><p>It was nice when she got to work with her hands. All the library crawling and ruin scrambling was great, but it did nothing to keep her mind distracted. And that was where his ghost liked to linger most. By the time Rey settled onto her bartered bunk, she didn’t have a single thought left which wasn’t still preoccupied by better optimizations she could have strung together for the scrapper’s haul droid. </p><p>“Never met someone so eager to get to Mustafar,” the pilot said, curiosity spelled all over their face. They spoke rough Basic and flew hard and fast. Rey got along like a house on fire with them. </p><p>Rey shrugged and gave her usual reply - “I have things that I need to do sooner, not later. Someone’s counting on me.”</p><p>The pilot heaved themself into the only free chair in the bunk room, one hand idly scratching their chestplate. They were an insectoid and not one that Rey recognized, either, from the wanderers that came through Niima Outpost or the many varied folks of the Resistance. “Someone who needs Mustafar?” the pilot chuckled. “Hardly!”</p><p>Rey folded her arms across her chest. “Why d’you say that?” she pressed. Sure, Mustafar wasn’t hospitable to fleshy, squishy humans like Rey. But if her time in the Resistance had taught her anything - never mind the lessons she scraped out of the few Jedi texts she had time to read in full - it was that every planet had something which could be useful. Necessary, even. And for Rey the challenge of pouring over something derelict, something “useless”, to find that gem of value, well that was just her daily life. </p><p>“Hail from there. Even I do not need Mustafar,” the pilot said simply. </p><p>Rey jerked forward, her cavalier attitude lost immediately. “You’re a native?” she asked with wonder. Kriff, something was looking up for her. When the pilot’s head bobbed in the affirmative she dove for her rucksack. “Hang on, hang on. This changes… well I don’t know what but it could do something!”</p><p>When she retrieved her tattered notebook, Rey quickly flipped to the two very empty pages that she had started based on Rose’s intel. <em> Mustafar’s native population is a dichotomy of insectoids. </em>Rey would kick herself later for not putting two and two together that a strange insectoid pilot would be returning to Mustafar </p><p>“So you know about the ‘bright star’ then?” Rey said breathlessly as she quickly uncapped a pen. </p><p>A poignant silence dropped between them. The pilot’s mouth bobbed open to yield few words. “Do not speak of it,” they hissed. </p><p>“Okay, sure, but you must know <em> something </em> about it. That tale’s old isn’t it?” Rey pressed.</p><p>The insectoid shuffled their limbs tighter to their frame. “<em>Will </em> not speak of it,” they said. Which meant there definitely was something there to talk about. </p><p>Rey pursed her lips. A fat droplet of ink lurched off her pen to stain the page. Coaxing people to talk wasn’t exactly her specialty. She shook the pen off and waved her hand in front of the pilot. “You can tell me,” she said stiffly. Tugging the Force along with the motion, she pressed on their mind. Just a little. </p><p>Their eyes narrowed and they uttered something guttural, probably a negative. </p><p>“No, really,” Rey insisted. “You can tell me. I’m a- a real good listener. Won’t tell a soul.” Pushing so hard didn’t feel right. The war had tapered down. This wasn’t a life or… well…</p><p>The pilot stood quickly. The chair crashed down behind them from the motion. “You stop asking or you stop flying,” they snapped. </p><p>Rey scowled. “Why though?”</p><p>“Not for outsiders. No more questions,” the pilot insisted. They righted the chair with a harsh slam and then brusquely left. </p>
<hr/><p>The rest of the trip was spent in a terse silence. Rey chewed on the inside of her lip, torn between her need for more details which her ride clearly harbored and the very practical reality that she couldn’t do anything if she didn’t make it planetside. She kept herself scarce until they finally touched down on the landing pad. </p><p>They watched silently with crossed arms as Rey carefully stepped down the ramp to disembark. She fought the inexplicably childlike impulse to get some final last word in. That wasn’t what she was here for. </p><p>Instead she examined the environment about her. Her brow furrowed. Granted she was at the astro port and that tended to mean things were more cultivated, but that didn’t explain the… trees? Sparse and bedraggled, nevertheless they were indeed growing and living trees set into the planet’s crust. Mustafar was a mining planet. A <em> lava </em> mining planet. Plants and wildlife didn’t mesh well with thousand degree heat the last time that Rey checked. </p><p>Rey turned around to once more face the ship. “Are you playing a joke? You said you were going to Mustafar.” </p><p>The pilot threw back their head and guffawed. “It’s no joke. Here you stand. Mustafar.” </p><p>Utterly baffled, Rey regarded the landscape again. Along the ground there were scraggly patches of grass and even the occasional hardy, flowering weed. When she closed her eyes and focused through the Force she could feel them. Each little plant with their roots tangled in the harsh soil of the planet. Sapping up nutrients and forcing new life to continue. </p><p>“Amazing,” Rey breathed. Even the air felt… well it wasn’t <em> clean </em> but no smog hung about and only the faintest hint of sulfur twitched at her nostrils. </p><p>There was really only one place in the cobbled-together town a few miles out from the port which seemed to be open to the public. Rey slunk into the inn-slash-tavern-slash-green-grocers and, after handing over the last half of her credits, made herself scarce in one of the corners of the downstairs common room. Sitting with her notebook perched on her knee and her staff to her back, Rey studied the goings on around her with quiet wonder. </p><p>Insectoids - <em> Mustafarians </em> - clustered about tables, guffawing and unwinding after their work shift. A server had dutifully brought Rey a loaf of bread, a drink, and a hearty looking stew. “Water’s from the well. Flash filtered. Let me know if it’s bitter, hun, It’s almost the end of the cycle and they might need changing,” he’d said. </p><p>Rey downed the stew within a few minutes and used the bread to sop up any remnant. Everything tasted phenomenal. Though maybe she was just used to spacer fare. When the server came back for the plate, Rey stopped him. “Where’s the meat from? Is there a grazing planet nearby?” she asked.</p><p>The server only laughed. “No, no. Hrrk over there-” he gestured to one of the Mustafarians at the edge of the bar “-she raises some damn fine local <em> strykka</em>. You want to pick up a flank or sausage? She butchers about once a week.”</p><p>“I don’t understand,” Rey admitted. “I thought this was just a mining planet. But you’ve got livestock?” </p><p>He hefted his tray of empty plates onto his other shoulder and leaned to pat Rey on the shoulder. “It’s okay. All the old travel logs out there haven’t bothered to get updated yet. Things are quite different now here,” he said cheerfully. “Ol’ Mustafar’s moving up in the galaxy!”</p><p>Rey retreated to her room feeling off. She couldn’t quite place the reason. Maybe it was the <em> strykka </em> not agreeing with her stomach. But when she looked out the tiny cutout that served as a window she knew it was this strange, thriving planet. </p><p>Certainly Rey didn’t consider herself to be “worldly and knowledgeable” about most planets. Even on Jakku she hadn’t traveled any farther than Niima, the wastes, and her little hovel. There were oases there and deep-surface mining towns which were fortunate enough to have flora and fauna beyond cacti and reptiles. But if she returned and found a forest growing by her AT-AT she would have been baffled. </p><p>Everything about Mustafar that Rey knew from idle anecdotes and whispered tales from the Empire told her it was a place of fire, pain, and death. She had seen the old Imperial fortress from the viewport of the ship when they had first landed. It had been built with its feet dug into volcanic rock and bore scattered heat shields to fend off the lava’s effect. </p><p>Peering through her window now, Rey could hardly see it for the expanse of tree branches reaching to the sky. Winter had given way to spring on this part of the hemisphere so if she squinted Rey might have been able to see the tiny green buds of newborn leaves on those closest to the lights of the town. High above, not a single heat shield glowed on the fortress. They were dormant and unneeded. </p><p>Hope bubbled up from deep within her chest. Rey tore her eyes away from the sight and sank onto her bunk. “Stop it,” she whispered to herself. This wasn’t the time to let something as silly as hope into her life again. Hope had gotten her through the end of the war - along with not a small amount of personal sacrifice - but it had failed her when she needed it most. </p>
<p></p><blockquote>
  <p>Two people bound in the force - a <em> dyad </em> they didn’t even have time to explore - laid tangled together on the stone floor of the ritual chamber. When Ben’s fingers carded through her hair to keep her head from tipping back, she wasn’t able to stop the smile from alighting on her lips. </p>
  <p>He had saved her. Just as she had back on the ruins of the Death Star. A mirror reflecting the deed back onto her. </p>
  <p>“Ben?” she dared to ask. Not because she questioned it, not now after all they had survived. But because when she asked he nodded. He accepted the name he had shunned, the path he had strayed from. After everything they had been through, wasn’t that moment worth it? </p>
</blockquote><p>Rey’s heart squeezed tight in her chest now. Every time she returned to the memory it just tore the wound back open. </p><p>Because she could feel it through their connection. She had sensed the moment that Ben Solo’s life left his body. One moment they were there together and alive. Then the next he slipped out of her hands, a whisper of light lost to the void. Along with it, his death tore out the last scrap of hope she’d dared to have that finally he might have the chance to live and be the man who knew the error of his ways. </p><p>She couldn’t let this errant ray of hope back into her heart. Not now. Not yet. There wasn’t enough tangible promise yet. </p><p>The leaf buds whispered as the night air blew between them and into her window. “I’m sorry,” Rey replied. “You’re not enough.” </p>
<hr/><p>Morning was bright and unbearably hot. Not a scrap of cloud covered the sky. Rey’s lips pressed in a flat line. The more her life changed, the more it stayed the same, she thought wistfully. </p><p>With her staff on her back and her last twenty credits ready, Rey managed a cart ride to the rancher Hrrk’s farm. Five credits got Rey the woman’s story and a voucher for three feet of sausage at the start of next week. Leading Rey out to the pastures, Hrrk told her tale. </p><p>Her land claim had once been on a stretch of volcanic rock that was leased to the Imperials and then the mining conglomerate to serve as a transport depot. It was flat and high up enough from the normal flows that buildings could be put up with only half the usual shielding. A crucial advantage. Hrrk pointed with long fingers to each remaining foundation that had been repurposed into fencing. </p><p>“Now the <em> strykka </em> sleep the night in the old admin building and feast all day in the fields where the trolleys were kept,” Hrrk said proudly. “Thank the star.” </p><p>Rey bit her lip to keep from jumping too quickly on the word. She had learned from her trip-up with the pilot. “The sun?” she asked lightly. </p><p>Hrrk shook her head. “No, not that. Though of course we would have nothing growing if we didn’t have that either. There’s a tale around these parts about a different star. The Bright Star. An artifact both ancient and powerful which had once kept Mustafar bountiful. Or something like that.”</p><p>Rey’s motions in removing her notebook and taking out her pen were careful and casual. “Does anyone know how it works? Or where it is now? That sounds… amazing if it was able to turn lava into fields.”</p><p>“Amazing indeed,” Hrrk said. “And no, I haven’t any idea. Most folk say not to speak about it. Superstitious that doing so might make it revert back. Things only began to improve maybe, oh, forty years ago? If that? I’m not one for superstitions. Just glad that I don’t have to huff sulfur all day and night.”</p><p>Rey chewed on the end of her pen. This was good confirmation of what she was seeing around her - something mystical bringing new life to the planet - but still just as vague. “Do you know who would know more?” Rey asked directly. </p><p>Hrrk scratched her long neck thoughtfully. “Some think that the Imps were involved. That they unearthed the Bright Star. None stayed behind after the great war. Just their empty builds,” she replied slowly. “Maybe you can find a console? If you’re crafty with tech like that. It’ll be old though. Older than me at least. Which says many things!” She laughed at herself. </p><p>Rey noted the advice down. The stronghold had been her next charted destination to follow up on the data files the lead originated from. Having the idea backed up by local reports was even better. “And what about the local lore? Does the town have a medicine woman? A shaman? Historian? I’d like to ask someone directly even if it just myth and legend,” Rey pressed.</p><p>Crossing her arms atop the fence, Hrrk examined Rey with squinted eyes. “You knew about this before I opened my silly mouth. And you didn’t want to know about the farm,” she remarked. </p><p>A wry smile spread across Rey’s lips. “Guilty,” she admitted. “But I was still swept up in amazement about the farm. Forty years from wasteland to sweet grass and <em> strykka? </em> That’s astounding.”</p><p>“What do you hope the Bright Star might gift you?” Hrrk wondered aloud. </p><p>“I have something that I need to do now. Someone’s counting on me,” Rey replied. “I can’t make them wait any longer.”</p><p>Hrrk hefted herself from the fence and brushed the dust from her palms. “Don’t let me hold you up, then. And be sure to come by next week for your meat or else it'll go to someone else. I don’t let a soul waste my meats.”</p>
<hr/><p>Three more credits. Another bumpy cart ride. Rey almost laughed at the Mustafarian’s expression when she asked to be dropped off at the cargo entrance of the Imperial stronghold. He regarded the building with tense glare. Rey slipped inside with barely a minute spent cracking the keypad. </p><p>The air inside was stagnant. Rey padded through the wide hallway with her breath held. The doorway behind her was the only source of significant light. All the consoles at the logistics checkpoint lay dormant, dead. The light bars set into the walls and ceilings didn’t even flicker to meet her steps. </p><p>Rey pulled her staff off her back and twisted the top emitter. It was shorter than her last saber to account for the staff’s length, but the yellow beam still happily lit her way deeper into the bones of the Imperial occupation. It was odd just how comfortable Rey was. Yet another reminder that this pilgrimage wasn’t so different than any other scavenging trek. That and the old Imperial halls didn’t carry the same menace now that it’s young successor had been forced back.</p><p>Instinct led the way. There was no rational explanation for how Rey found the command center or the locked-down rooms that lay behind it. No backup power existed for these blast doors. Rey had to melt the locking mechanisms and physically shove one door inch by inch to force her way in. </p><p>“What are you doing <em> here </em>?”</p><p>Rey whirled on the balls of her feet to find the speaker. Her hands switched in that comfortable, routine way from using the saber as a light source to a true weapon once more. The room was still empty. No one had followed her. </p><p>“Show yourself,” Rey hissed. She made a quick circuit through the space, kicking off heavy blankets from the bed and sticking her head in the refresher to be certain. When she returned to the doors, the undamaged one was now fully open. Standing with one hand resting on its edge was a tall, young man. </p><p>Rey narrowed her eyes and levered her saber to his chest. “You?” She had seen this man before. Not as frequently as the others who more readily sought to give her “Jedi wisdom” but enough to recognize his sandy hair and gloved hand. </p><p>“I didn't think anyone would ever come back to this place. Lest of all a Jedi,” the young Skywalker mused. He ignored the saber pointed at his face and stepped into the room. He passed through the blade without issue. Rey gritted her teeth and brought the staff close once more. Resting the butt of it on the ground, it served as a torch of sorts. </p><p>“You’re Ben’s grandfather, right?” Rey asked. He nodded, still lost in his own thoughts as he approached the desk. With slow, almost hesitant motions he began to comb through its contents. </p><p>Rey swallowed. Her fingers drummed on the body of her staff. “You were here as a Sith?” </p><p>“Vader was here, yes,” Anakin replied. He had passed beyond the reach of her saber but his form shimmered just so in the dark. He was a Force ghost much the same as Master Luke was now, but there was something different to him. It was as though the edge of his was darker. More faded. He didn’t belong as readily to the living Force. </p><p>But he was still here and speaking to her. Rey realized suddenly how idiotic she had been these past few days. “You’re the one whose logs Rose sent me! From your ship. Vader’s ship,” Rey exclaimed. </p><p>“You can tell me about the Bright Star,” Rey insisted. </p><p>Anakin paused. His eyes looked past into some unknown horizon. “No,” he replied flatly. He snapped a drawer shut and switched to the opposite side. </p><p>Rey’s blood boiled. “What do you mean ‘no’? This was your past. You lived through whatever caused the planet to be born again. You have to know why I’m looking for it. Tell me,” Rey ordered. She was getting kriffing pissed at being told she couldn’t ask for what she needed. </p><p>She slung her saber onto her back and stomped to the desk. Slapping her hands on the surface, she squared off with Anakin eye-to-eye. “Tell me,” she repeated. </p><p>He shook his head, forced back to focusing on the room around him. “It won’t give you solace. I refuse to let someone else make the same mistakes that I did. Besides, I wasn’t the one who brought life back here. Vader failed. <em> I </em>failed. And it was pure luck that the whole planet didn’t crumble to dust for it,” Anakin said. His eyes softened as he regarded Rey. </p><p>“I know your pain. I lost my love, too.”</p><p>Rey’s lips curled back into a snarl. “Then you have to know that I <em> need </em> to try something to bring him back. He’s your own blood! We’re a dyad! Doesn’t that mean something?” she hissed. </p><p>All Kylo Ren had wanted to do was return to Vader’s legacy. It consumed him, drove his every waking moment. Even when he knew in the churning depths of his gut that it wasn’t right, he still refused to let go of the goal. </p><p>Rey had seen it from the moment their minds first had been brought together by Kylo’s interrogation. She’d mocked him for it, scoffed that he had bound his identity to something so impossible, so nebulous. How could you live up to the legacy of a failure? A man who had raged through the galaxy taking everything for his liege lord and ended up empty handed? </p><p>And yet Vader’s legacy - Anakin’s legacy - was indeed what Ben Solo had by the fingertips when he’d arrived on Exegol. </p><p>Only for everything to be ripped away.</p><p>Rey let the tears drip down her face, hot and angry. “Can’t you see that I need him back? I know it’s possible. He’s so close. At night, I feel him. Another weight on the mattress. I see him, flashes in the crowd. Ben is supposed to be alive. He has to be! I have to do this for him,” Rey begged.</p><p>Anakin dropped into the empty chair behind the desk. Conflict and pity scrawled across his face. He turned to look away. “Forty years ago, Darth Vader took the Bright Star from its people and used a dark, terrible machine to tear at the void between life and death. All to return my Padme to me.</p><p>“It almost destroyed this planet. It would even have destroyed me, I think, if it had run to its completion. But someone stopped it. Broke the machine and shattered the Star. <em> That </em> is what restored this planet. Stopping that foolish ritual of death is what finally allowed proper life to return to Mustafar,” Anakin said harshly. </p><p>He still refused to look at Rey. The greys and blues that made up the surface of his being were mottled and faded. He was transfixed at the last drawer he had pulled open. </p><p>Rey could only let her fists shake with frustration. Her chest was tight with each heaving breath. It wasn’t right. It wasn’t <em> fair</em>. </p><p>She let her breathing ease out, though her fingers refused to leave her fists. “Look what the Star is doing for an entire planet,” she said. “It has to be able to help just one soul come back if it can bring forests to life atop a volcanic plain, hasn’t it?”</p><p>“I don’t know,” he admitted. “It is… odd that Ben is not here in the Force with us. Yet I don’t believe he has moved on like my Padme has.” A pregnant pause sat between his thoughts. “It is possible that you wouldn’t need to tear the void apart to find him. But I still don’t know if that makes it any more likely to occur.”</p><p>Rey laughed bitterly. “I presume no one knows where the Star’s pieces are, either.”</p><p>He cocked his head. “Why?”</p><p>“Because fortune does not favor me,” Rey said honestly. “And I don’t have decades to find them all regardless. I’m sure he’ll fade before then.”</p><p>Anakin’s head bobbed slowly in agreement. “That is most certainly true. But you’re wrong on one account. Or one shard’s account. Vader did recover one. Just one,” he said. </p><p>Rey practically climbed over the desk to grab Anakin by his ghostly shoulders. “Where?” she gasped.</p><p>Anakin didn’t answer. He was gone. In the drawer, glinting in the yellow light of Rey’s saber, sat a single chunk of crystal. </p>
<hr/><p>By the time Rey exited the stronghold, her heart was heavy. She had spent <em> hours </em> scouring the rest of the command center for another tiny crumb to follow. Her reward was a painful crick in her neck and a fresh wave of despair. Anakin had never returned, even when Rey reached out to him. Her stomach protested the near full day without eating, so she was forced to leave.  </p><p>Sunrise should have been beautiful to behold as its golden beams made every tree branch glimmer and gleam. Rey glowered at the sight instead. She understood how Vader had felt. She would have burned down the whole forest to find the remaining shards of the shattered Bright Star. </p><p>Her legs dropped out from under her and Rey plunged to her hands and knees. Weeks of searching. Months of effort - hers and her friends’ - had led to… what? Dried up leads and a single, broken piece of artifact. </p><p>Something warm and heavy lay on her shoulder. Rey choked back a sob as she leaned into Ben’s embrace. Another flashback memory. Another hopeless dream. </p><p>His chest thrummed as he hummed an unknown tune to soothe her. His chin rested atop her head. She could feel how it moved when he took a breath. </p><p>“I’m so sorry, Ben,” she whispered. Her hand clutched the tiny crystal until it dug harshly into her flesh. </p><p>“Don’t be,” he replied. “I never asked for you to be my keeper. I would never do that to you.”</p><p>Rey let his words and presence soothe her anger. Slowly she allowed her fist to relax. She held the tiny crystal up to the dawning sun. It almost made it look like it was glowing. “This once had the power to raise the dead,” Rey sighed. </p><p>“Sounds like a terrible power,” Ben replied. “There are many who should not even dream of being alive once more.”</p><p>Rey sighed and leaned her cheek into the crook of his arm. This was cruel. Her dreams had hurt before when she hadn’t heard Ben’s voice once again. Now to have the delusion of speaking with him… it was too much like the hope she had to avoid. </p><p>“Are you going to fade away? Once I can’t remember what you looked like. What you sounded like.” Rey asked. </p><p>Ben made a surprised noise. “I hope not. It was horrible the first time. I’d prefer to outlive you this time,” he replied candidly. </p><p>Rey twisted in his arms to stare at him in bewilderment. “Come again?” This wasn’t right. This wasn’t a memory. And she didn’t… actually… remember any of this having happened before. The scraggly trees on Mustafar waved about them rather than the ghastly chamber on Exegol or the endless void of her dreamscape. </p><p>“Ben?” she dared to ask. She waited for him to nod, for him to slip once more out from her grasp.</p><p>“Yes, Rey?”</p><p>“How are you… here?”</p><p>He gathered her hands into his and plucked the tiny shard between his thumb and forefinger. “If this tiny thing could bring back an ancient forest, don’t you think it could bring back the other half of a dyad crying out in the Force?” Ben said simply. “I was with you for so long. I knew you hadn’t let go. I knew you were trying to find an answer. Trying to find me. So I made sure I was ready for you.”</p>
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